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Wednesday, January 17, 2018

January Personal Update

The last time I updated was at the beginning of December. Since then, we've had Yule, Christmas and New Years, meaning it's been a hectic several weeks! And all that mad rush comes to a screeching halt when the first turns over. The holidays have ended, slow season is in full swing and life just kind of... idly strolls by. That is, unless you're buried eye-deep (literally) in autoimmunity. Then, once the stress dies down, the flares come out.

Such is life, right?

Let's take a look at the past month or so.

The last time I updated, Artie still had his cone on. After two weeks of dealing with it amazingly well, we finally got the stitches removed and the cone came off! His treat for all of this?

Delicious Puppucino of course.

Artie's never had one - or any whip cream for that matter - and it seemed senseless to deprave him of it after a bout with cancer.

Holiday parties, mostly corporate ones, were the majority of my December gigs. It was certainly a busier season than I'm used to, but I definitely won't complain!

I know I mentioned in December that I had a corneal ulcer. I also, on a totally unrelated incident, ended up with a severely blocked tear duct over the holidays.

For as small as it looks, it packed one hell of a punch with pain. Not quite a full blown scleritis break out with radiating pain through my cheek bone and into my jaw but more like a bruised nose and eye. Like maybe someone punched me. It wasn't pleasant.

I realize no one looks flattering when they're in pain and at the doctor but uh, yeesh.
Good luck bleaching that from your brain.
I look miserable.

Our eye doctor is amazing though. Obviously, I got everything I needed to treat it but, on top of that, he gave me his cell number. If it got worse over the holiday weekend, he would meet me at the office to lance it. Even if it were Christmas Eve or Day. I landed the jackpot on this optometrist, let me tell you.

Fortunately, it healed up after antibiotic drops and antibiotic meds.

Aaron and I spent Christmas Eve at home, which gave us a chance to have a nice candlelit meal and enjoy each other's company. We're often kind of ships passing in the night with our jobs and lives.

Christmas Day was spent at my parents' house. I title the above picture "The difference between a familiar and a pet in a single photograph."

I want to thank readers Jonathan and Betsy for the awesome book gifts!

And, same day no less, the car in front of me bought my coffee for me.

I think I literally came home and cried about how good everyone is to my husband for an hour. Then I went through and purchased $100 worth of witchy wishlist requests and volunteered with my husband's work to help serve 3rd shift Christmas dinner because there's no way that many good things happens without paying it forward.

Aaron and I spent New Years Eve in this year. Typically, we don't. Last year we gamed and the year before, I think I hosted. This year, we're hosting as well. But neither of us felt up for anything. So we played games, had a little champagne (Actually, I just had some sparkling grape juice to avoid the heartburn. I'm old.), did a ritual and went to bed.

After the first of the year, the circle and I started the restructuring of our Noviceship program. We'll be working on it the entire year to prepare for 2019 Novices. I'm actually quite excited about this. It's one of the things the spirits of my New Year's Eve ritual said needed to happen. I think the Primaries feel a little overwhelmed right now because we have an entire year of working on this but it'll be good for them, for me, for the circle in general and for future witchlings.

The pets have been doing well.

Artie gave us a bit of a scare this past week. We noticed a lump on his shoulder, so I took him in for an FNA to make sure it wasn't a new cancerous growth. Nope - just a cyst. Then, five days later, we found a large lump on his hip. Aaron took him in the next morning - just a reaction to the rabies vaccination since I went ahead and vaccinated him when we did the FNA earlier that week.

Lumpy buddy keeps making my heart jump!

I also have to say that our vet is amazing as well. They didn't charge me for the FNA when it turned out to be a cyst even though the needle was utilized and they didn't charge us at all when we came in about the rabies vaccination lump. Plus, I mean, they caught cancer that three other vets didn't so uh, yeah, I'm pretty loyal at this point.

Zeus is next on my vaccination and check up list. Being a senior cat at 9 years old, he's due for blood work. Plus I want to talk to them about his hyperesthesia. I know there's not much we can do but he's just... so itchy, poor thing. We've tried shampoos and sprays but nothing seems to cull it. And we can't do steroids because he's so overweight - which we're working on - but it risks diabetes. Some days it's so bad that, if I just touch his back, he falls on the floor and spazzes out about it. I wish there was something - anything - I could do for him. I mean, it's not necessarily affecting his quality of life heavily but it's frustrating for both of us, especially if his claws latch into me during an episode.

Not that the lovebug doesn't find ways around it.

Then Sasspants, I mean Hermes, will go in.

Followed by Derpy - I mean Apollo.

Oh. No. Nevermind. I definitely meant Derpy.

I don't necessarily expect anything to be wrong on either of their parts. Probably just routine vaccinations and blood work. But it's that time of the year and it needs to be done.

7 comments:

Of course! The package actually just came in a couple of days ago. I've been meaning to send you an e-mail about it and it kept slipping my mind so I'm glad you saw this! Thank you so much for everything!

I'm a member of a local cat-lover fb page and a lot of our people recommend CBD oil and/or anxiety meds for hyperesthesia. I'm in a pretty hippie place though so various cannabis-based products being proclaimed magical panaceas is pretty common here so you know. Grain of salt, shrug emoji.

I feel like CBD oil is our generation's shark liver oil. But of course, I won't knock it unless I try it, so I might reach out to someone and give it a shot. I'll also talk to my vet about anti-anxiety meds. I don't think it's anxiety though - Zeus is chill as a cucumber. It seems to be related more to allergies (he also has asthma that kicks up when mine does and mine is allergies). That's why they think steroids would help but, with his weight, won't act on it.

I have a cousin who keeps posting stuff on fb re: The Man is repressing information on how weed-and weed by-products can literally cure death, so yes. Our generation's kids are going to be really eyerolly about mom and dad's cannabis phase.

I'm Marietta, a nontheistic witch mixing modernity with traditional practices. My blog focuses on my journey with my familiars and connected spirits, diving deeper into my work with the Man in Black and my psychopomp guide D. Here, I present my rituals, altars and spells as needed while exploring witchcraft theory and history.